


Little Thief

by BabyGecko



Category: Pirates of the Caribbean (Movies)
Genre: 21st century gal in an 18th century world, F/M, Mythology - Freeform, Pirates, Slow Burn, Time Travel, boats. with guns. gunboats, drink up me hearties yo ho, heck yeah man I love pirates, starts pre CotBP, swashbuckling
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-03-03
Packaged: 2021-03-17 02:07:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28841379
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BabyGecko/pseuds/BabyGecko
Summary: When arrested for shoplifting, Amy Yegg is approached by a titan. She is offered a choice: be charged with a crime she only slightly committed, or accept a proposal.If she accepts, she agrees to carry out the titan's biding. To free his daughter from her human form and kill the man who betrayed her. And only when the task is complete is she able to get her life back.So she is told to complete the task with noble heart and intention? No. She must lie, steal and cheat her way to victory. We are dealing with pirates, after all.Drink up me hearties yo ho!****Slow burn Jack Sparrow/OFC
Relationships: Elizabeth Swann/Will Turner, Jack Sparrow/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 18
Kudos: 17





	1. Chapter 1

This couldn’t be happening. There was no way this was happening, no possible way. A plain clock hung up on the ugly grey wall ticked slowly, the only noise in the otherwise deadly silent holding room.  
I wrapped my arms around myself. It offered little comfort, but I didn’t let go all the same. The tick-tick-tick drilled into my head, growing more and more unbearable by the second. Occasionally I would see a figure dart by the door, which held the only window, and my heart would skip a beat. How long had it been? Twenty minutes? Forty? An hour?

At least the ride had been fun. Sort of. Well, fun in the way I could always tell my grandkids one day that I had ridden in a police car. They didn't use the sirens, disappointedly, but beggars couldn’t be choosers.  
It was just that the whole situation didn’t make any sense. When I had left the shop, I hadn’t put anything in my bag to set off the alarms. I mean, I had stolen pieces on my person, but when my bag got searched, it was stuffed impossibly full of precious merchandise. Stuff I had not even touched, proudly showing off their security tags to the security guard. That had pretty much sealed my fate.  
After a lifetime of sticky fingers, I had finally come to face the consequences. And I wasn’t particularly liking it.

The door opened, jotting me out of my thoughts. Two ashy haired and equally ashy faced police officers entered, and sat opposite me.  
No one made any effort to move.

“Look, there’s been a mistake,” I tried, morphing my face to look as sympathetic as possible. It didn’t take much. “I swear, if you check the security footage, there is nothing showing me stuffing any of that stuff into my bag.”

They kept staring forward, not even blinking.  
“Please,” I said, leaning across the table. “Check the footage, it should prove what I’m telling you.”

“They can’t hear you, Miss Atropos.”

Someone else was in the room. I spun around in my chair, and there, skulking in the corner of the room under the harsh, white light, a third police officer stood.  
  
“How did you get in here?” I asked, leaning back to see if there was any fake wall or trapdoor or anything. There wasn’t.   
The third man snorted and took a long drag of a glowing cigar despite being stood under a ‘no smoking’ sign.

“That is what irks you? My existence, and not my words?”

Good point, actually. But no need to go all Shakespear on me.

“I was getting to that,” I lied. “But I find your sudden appearance to be a tad more threatening than anything you might be telling me. At this current moment, in the very least. Is there a spring door behind you by any chance?”

“You’re still not listening,” he said.   
Using his foul-smelling cigar, he pointed to where the two police officers sat in front of me. I followed his movement. Both of them were burning holes through me with their intense stare, but oddly enough, neither of them were reacting to anything. I didn’t even see a hint of them blinking. It was as if they were completely frozen. My mouth started to run dry.

“You’re not with them, are you?”

I could hear him blowing out a stream of smoke. “Finally, I thought you’d never get it, Miss Atropos.”  
That made me falter as well.

“How do you know my name?” I asked, a gradual build up of nerves starting to churn in my stomach. “No-one ever calls me that.”

“Aye, but it is your name,” he continued, paying not attention to my growing discomfort. “And to allow one’s name to become unused, it becomes forgotten, that’s as good as letting your very soul rot away into nothing.”

Maybe he was enjoying himself, I didn’t know, but I was really starting to get fed up with all the hocus-pocus nature of his talking. A strange man materialises in the same room as you, apparently freezes the men who arrested you for shoplifting, and decided to deliver a soliloquy?

“Who are you?”

He threw his hands up in the air. “Thank goodness! There is a hint of a brain in there, lurking somewhere.”

I scowled at him. “You don’t have to be so cryptic. I think it’s a fair conclusion, and quite frankly, I’m not in the mood to be joked around with.”

“No,” he agreed, inhaling another breath of putrid smoke. “No, you’re about to be charged with theft. Hardly the time to be having a jest.”

He tutted at me, finally stepping out of the corner. The closer he got, the more I noticed how unsettling his eyes were. Void of any pupils, they flickered like small hurricanes, a weathered and stormy grey to match his hair. I backed out of my chair. He seemed to find that quite funny.

“You didn’t answer me,” I said. “Who. Are. You.”

Smoke billowed out his nose, and his eyes flashed with lightning.

“I am Atlas,” he said finally. “And I have a proposition for you.”

  
He snapped his fingers, and the world melted away. And suddenly, I was falling.

***

I opened my eyes. Harsh white light glared back at me, and I shut them again quick.

“What the hell is this place,” I muttered. “It’s too goddamn bright.”

“Hmm.” Holding up a hand as a shoddy shield, I squinted up at the apparent eldritch being who had effectively kidnapped me. Or helped me in a jail break. Either way, nothing good.  
“Not the usual reaction to being in the space between worlds, but then again, why would that impress you,” he said flatly. He was staring into the distance, which I’m sure was fascinating, and started walking away.

Sighing, I got to my feet. My entire body ached as if I’d been thrown onto the ground. Well, I most likely had, considering all the falling.

“A hand would’ve been nice,” I called after him, trailing after for lack of anything else to do.

Atlas glanced back at me, unbothered. “And yet, here you are, on your feet. Without assistance, I might add.”  
He laughed at my expression, which I gathered meant I was giving him a truly sour look. “Best foot forward now, Miss Atropos, the real work is yet to begin.”  
With everything he said, it felt like I was going in circles.

We continued to walk through the white abyss, though it hardly seemed like we were going anywhere. If you kept looking forward to where the horizon should be, the ground was indistinguishable from the sky. Every so often a streak of coloured light whizzed over our heads, the slightest echo of life calling out to those who could hear it.

“Who are you?” I asked.

He peered down at me. “I believe we’ve already been introduced.”

“Yes, you told me your name, but-”

He held up a hand, cutting me off. “No no, I didn’t tell you my name, I told you my identity. Atlas is who I am.”

Did he have to make everything way more confusing than it had to be? I frowned at him. “So, Atlas isn’t your name? What do I call you then?”  
Atlas gave me a look as if I was incredibly stupid. I felt that was pretty harsh, considering he had managed to effectively teleport us to nowhere, and I was yet to kick off about it.

“I am unsure as to why you are so passionate about what people call me,” he said. “I know who I am, maybe you should be more concerned about who you are.”

It was like he was trying to make me lose my mind. “I know who I am.”

He didn’t answer, though he seemed to find that statement funny.

I ploughed on. “Besides, I meant, ‘who are you’, more as ‘what are you’. And I think you knew that.”

One of his eyebrows quirked, amused. “Did I now? We’ve known each other for so little time, I’m thrilled you know my most intimate thoughts, Miss Atropos.”

“Amy. My initials spell out A-M-Y, so people call me Amy.”

He stopped walking. “Well, I am not people, Miss Atropos. I suppose that is what you have been hinting at, yes?”

“Well,” I said. “If you mean ‘asked directly several times’, and not ‘hinted at’.”

“I am Atlas,” he continued over me. “And therefore, I am the bearer of worlds.”  
Excellent stuff. It was so wonderful I just so happened to get arrested and shoved into the same room that he magically appeared in.

“So glad to hear it,” I answered. “Any chance you are going to tell me why you sprung me from jail, or is that another thing I’m going to have to figure out by myself.”

Overhead, a streak of green flew by, accompanied by a strange mix of firework bangs and record scratches. Atlas followed it’s path with his eyes. It must have been a good sign or something, as he came away from it looking pleased.

“Have you already forgotten my request, Miss Atropos?”

“Amy,” I corrected. “And, I don’t know if you noticed, but I was a little busy being thrown through the air.”

We had apparently arrived at our destination, though I couldn’t tell what was different about this spot than anywhere else we had just walked past. Atlas waved a hand, and a table with matching chairs grew up out of the ground. Maybe I was supposed to find this a spectacular feat or a frightening prospect, but honestly at this point I was just mentally exhausted. Magic growing furniture was not the weirdest thing that I had seen that day, and it might as well happen. He gestured for me to take a seat. I obeyed. The chairs had a funny feel to them, as if I was sitting atop of a sturdy foam. I didn’t like it.

“I have a job for you, Miss Atropos.” Atlas sat across from me, pulling out another one of his foul cigars, and this time round I saw that it wasn’t a lighter he had used to light it, but rather a naked flame dancing on his finger tip. That was by far the best of his magic tricks. Thick plumes of smoke curled around his nose as he blew out an impressive cloud. I tried not to breathe it in, though I could feel a little tendril tickle the inside throat and coughed violently.  
This did not phase the man.

“What-What kind of job?” I asked, trying to calm my breathing. “And why me?”

He smoothed a hand over the weird foamy table, and a picture of a woman appeared. Her long dark hair was twisted into dreadlocks, small trinkets tied in at random, and her dark eyes looked up at me, mischievous and glinting with secrets. For a brief moment, I thought I recognised her.

“My daughter, Calypso, has been bound to a human form,” Atlas explained. “I want you to free her, and kill the man who was behind her binding.”

I tore my eyes away from the woman. “So when you say Atlas, you mean...that Atlas. Proper mythology Atlas, from the Ancient Greeks.”

He sighed, clearly unimpressed. “I did tell you I was the bearer of worlds. What did you think I was, if not ‘that Atlas’, as you so kindly put?”

I shrugged. “I don’t know. Street magician?”

He didn’t laugh. Rude. “Mythology exists because of belief, Miss Atropos. Such strong, unwavering belief. That fact that we are still around in your time is no accident. Our names live on because of that wickedly strong belief. Your namesake, for example. Atropos, the cutter of fate, you think she would just cease to exist because of the passage of time?”

“I don’t know. I mean, I read Percy Jackson, so I guess not.” I rocked back on my chair, fidgeting. “But what do you need me for? You’re a god, right?

“Titan,” he corrected, but I ignored that.

“Why don’t you just do your little zap-zap-zap that you did to me? Transport her here, change her form, and Bob’s your uncle, she’s back home in time for tea.”

Atlas clearly didn’t care for my casual tone. He leant over the table, expression stony. I could see the little thunderstorms in his eyes crackle with energy and swirl ferociously.

“You recognise my mortal name, Miss Atropos. You must know of how us immortals are unable to go where mere mortals tread. Why there are numerous mortal heroes following divine orders and biddings. This is the work of men, and I am unable to engage in the work of men. She was tricked into giving divine knowledge to one she called her lover, and he betrayed her. That is the man who must die for his part in trapping a god.”’

As he talked, the stormier and wilder his eyes got, and I saw the titan before me in the clothing of a man.

“Okay,” I said, trying to bring the conversation back down. I knew gods (or titans) had a habit of smiting mortals when they lost their temper. I wasn’t in the mood to be smited just yet.   
“So you need a mortal to do the dirty work for you, I get it. But again, why me? You really want a 23 year old makeup artist who had never been in a fight and just got arrested for shoplifting to go and free a goddess?” I cast a brief look down at myself. I was all smooth and rounded at the edges, like a friendly teddy-bear. If this titan thought I could undo a divine binding and commit murder, he had clearly misjudged.

Atlas moved back from leaning vaguely threateningly over his weird table, his eye storms flickering back to just rolling grey clouds. At least he wasn’t going to evaporate me or anything just yet.

“I’ve been watching you for some time now, Miss Atropos,” he said. Eww. Internally, I made a face, thinking about all the times I had been re-enacting my favourite musical theatre moments in the shower. Not too closely I hoped.

“And you have,” he continued, ignoring my expression. “A certain gift, perfectly suited for this nature of task.”

“A gift,” I repeated flatly. Ooh, how marvellous, I was gifted at being selected for a hero’s gauntlet. Lucky me.

He swiped a hand over the picture of the woman, and it changed. Now I was greeted by a picture of myself pickpocketing someone. I was a bit irked that there existed photographic proof of that.

“I have rarely seen such a high success rate of thieving tricks, Miss Atropos. You may sit here and call me a magician, yet you have a history of sleight-of-hand, of twisting a tale with the skill of a silvered tongue, of convincing others of truths that are not quite truthful. And that is the person I want to complete this task for me.”

“A crook,” I confirmed. “A manipulative crook, is what you mean.” A bit hurtful that my only apparent accolade in life was being a swindler, but at least it got recognised by an eldritch being. Hooray.

“No, someone who can twist the world around them into what they desire. Where I required you to go, you will need to convince everyone in your surroundings to assist you in your task, and many of them will not be easy to convince. And now I ask of you, Miss Atropos Margaret Yegg, will you accept?”

I chewed on my lip, and shifted my weight. To be perfectly honest, no I didn’t want to accept the stupid quest thing. I wanted to be curled in my bed, mindlessly scrolling on my phone, as many respectable young women did.

“If I don’t?” I asked. I knew I wasn’t going to like the answer.

Atlas spread his hands. “You will be returned to your holding room about to be arrested for petty thievery. If you do this for me, however, the items that magically appeared in your bag, can just as easily be magically gone.”

I stood up, outraged. “It was you! You planted all that shit on me!” I should have know that the one time I got caught it was all because of a stupid titan.

He grinned, coldly. “I may not be able to dabble that much in the way of mortals, but I’m not without power at all. I figured you may need some-”

“Blackmailing?” I interrupted annoyed, crossing my arms.

“Gentle persuasion, shall we call it,” he finished, a smugness on his features that I found most disagreeable.

I huffed, and sat back in my chair. “Do I get a hint? Like somewhere to start? Any enchanted talisman to assist me in my quest? Or am I to be flung into the unknown for the second time today?”

Atlas sat up a tad straighter, rubbing his chin in thought. “Hmm, let me see...enchanted, you say?”

Standing up, he looked up intently. I followed his eyeline, but I didn’t seem to catch onto his idea. A purple streak went by, a funny little tinny whistle chirping merrily from it, and Atlas stuck his hand into it. Every little twist of his wrist created a loud crash, and I just hoped the purple streak was going to be okay after having a hand shoved through it’s supposed belly.  
After enough rummaging, he brought his hang out, tugging a brown lump out with it. I hoped that wasn’t the purple streak’s stomach, or worse, waste. After being thoroughly prodded at, the streak seemed to recover, and continued it’s little whistling journey. That made one of us.

“Here.” He threw the lump at me, which I barely managed to catch. “Enchanted item for the hero’s quest,” he said sarcastically.   
It was a worn, leather bag. The kind of book bag that old people used as kids, and came back into fashion for some reason. Just more beat up and old.

“Uh, thank you?” I turned it over in my hands. Did it say what it did on the bottom like toys did? Or was that another wonderful guess for me to make.

“That bag will give you whatever you require,” Atlas said. “Within reason, of course. You’re not going to be able to pull out anything larger than it will allow, naturally.”

“Oh, right. That would be too weird.” At least it was something genuinely useful. I was half expecting him to give me a bag that was enchanted to look like a duck. I went to stick my hand in.

“But,” Atlas said, making me freeze and let my hand hover over it. “You can only use it once a day. So you must use it wisely.”

I snatched my hand away. “Right. Got it.” I threw it over my shoulder. “Anything else I should know? Does it explode if you try to use it more than once in one afternoon?”

Atlas rolled his eyes upwards, clearly regretting giving me any help at all. “No, but should anyone other than yourself find out about it’s nature, by your word or theirs, it will resort back to its original state.”

Huh, just that? I could do that. “No telling people I have a magic bag,” I agreed. “Easy-peasy.”

Atlas reached across the table, holding his hand out. “So, Miss Atropos. Do we have an agreement?”

I eyed his hand, fiddling with the bag strap. Didn’t god’s have a history of tricking people? Would it be a mistake to accept this, and it would be far, far safer to just take the consequences of magically assisted shoplifting? But there was a part of my brain still niggling. The woman, Calypso, had looked infuriatingly familiar. And once my brain latched onto something, I found it hard to squash the curiosity.

“I want a hint.” I held the bag close to my body, just in case he changed his mind about magical item assistance. “So I’m not going on a goose chase. Something that will put me back on track should I get further away from what you want me to do. But other than that, yes, I agree.”

Atlas narrowed his eyes. “Very well. Follow the sparrow. It’s path should lead to where you are needed.”

I faltered. “My hint is that I have to follow a bird? What a whole load of bollocks-”

Atlas snapped his fingers, and once again, I was falling.


	2. Chapter 2

Wet...why did I feel all wet? I hated being wet with a passion, save for showers, so how on earth did I end up in this predicament? My clothes were plastered against my skin, and as much as I tried to heave my arm upwards, it wouldn’t budge. My head pounded furiously, aching with every fibre of it’s being and I could feel my stomach starting to churn with nausea.  
Please don’t throw up, please don’t throw up, please don’t throw up, I chanted in my mind, willing it to become true. My eyelids felt gross and tacky, like when you went to bed without removing your heavy makeup from the night before, and they held like glue when I attempted to open them.  
Everything just felt so...exhausting. It was much simpler to just lay still, and try to prevent my inevitable vomit. But even when I didn’t move an inch, my body still rocked and swayed with reckless abandon.

A brash noise cut through the air, an ugly nasally squawking that was piercing directly though my already compromised head. Was that my alarm, maybe? I didn’t remember changing the ringtone to such an abrasive sound. A gentler noise was present as well, I suddenly noticed. A soft, lapping sound. Like when you sat down in a bath too quickly, and the water sloshed all over the floor.

Was I in a boat, or something? I didn’t live near any beaches. I didn’t know anyone who had a boat. What the hell was going on? And why was my stupid body still not responding! Had I gone out drinking myself to death last night and ended up on someone’s rowboat? Wait, no. Wasn’t I just in a completely white place with a guy in a suit...Atlas. Had the bastard just dropped me into the middle of the ocean? No wonder I felt awful.

Something shuffled near me, accompanied by heavy footsteps that were getting louder. Someone was approaching. I pretended to still be asleep, which wasn’t hard. Hopefully they’d bugger off and let me recover in my own sweet time, though I was starting to doubt it.

“What’ve we got ‘ere then,” a voice mumbled.

Uh oh. That didn’t sound too good. Okay, forget pretending to sleep. I struggled to move myself, even my fingers barely twitched. A long, pained noise filled the air, and I was so out of it, it took me way too long to realise that it was me groaning and not in fact a broken fog horn.

“Easy ther, lass,” the voice said, a thick accent I couldn’t place rolling off their tongue. “Tha’s a nasty cut to the ‘ead.”

That probably explained the pounding. I pried an eye open, but my body was still fighting against me. With a blazing sun glaring down at me, bright spots dotted my vision. No matter how many times I attempted to blink them away, they stubbornly stayed. It was beyond frustrating.

On the brightside, I was finally able to wrench my arm off the floor. It flopped pathetically through the air, as I used it to shield my poor eyes from the stupid sun. There was a huffing sound next to me, which I think was the person drawing in a sharp intake of breath. Clearly, they were just as surprised as I was to see me eventually move a limb.

“Now, who did tha’ te yah…” the voice mumbled again. I snorted. If they meant the cut to my head, I could think of one stupid grey old titan who hand a hand in this situation.

“Cap’in, the Navy! I sees ther’ white sails,” a new concerned voice said. The Navy? Was I really on a boat then? And where the heck was the Navy involved? I didn’t know enough about the military for this.

“Aye,” the voice closer to me said. “We best be on our way.”

Um, no thank you, I would rather not be kidnapped by sailors who avoided the navy. I tried protesting, but all that really came out was a thin whine. Next to me, there was a loud ripping noise, and a rough hand grabbed the wrist that was currently acting as my pair of sunglasses.

“Oi…Ge’off…” I mumbled, my lips cracking painfully. A wetness spread across them, and judging from the metallic taste, they had probably started to bleed. Very nice. Just what the situation demanded.

Whoever had just grabbed my arm politely ignored my protests, and I felt something wrap around my wrist, before getting secured with a tight knot. There went my circulation. What were they playing at? Was this really the time to be getting randomly accessorised?

“Cap’in!” the urgent voice repeated.

My arm was dropped, falling back onto my face rather painfully. I suspect it made the supposed bad cut even worse, and it sent a horrible shiver of pain throughout my whole body, like spindly fingers made of knives were tracing my veins. The dark spots took over, clouding vision, and I felt my consciousness slip away. The last thing I could remember was a sharp scent of something sweet and smoky before I was lost to the world.

***

The next thing I knew, I was suddenly ice cold. And wet, again. That sure as heck managed to wake me up properly.

“Ushhsgh!” I said, or rather, spluttered. Thank god I wasn’t trying to say anything important.  
Two guys stood in front of me, one guiltily holding a bucket, and at least the both of them had the decency to look bad about my impromptu shower.

“Sorry, miss,” the one with the bucket said meekly. “We tried shaking you awake, an’ smelling salts, but you weren’t coming too.”

I just stared at them, bewildered. What on earth were they wearing? Matching smart, red jackets, each with an x-men-esque white cross on the front. Also the pirate hats. Why were they wearing pirate hats? Or, no, my mistake - pointy 18th century hats.  
I risked a look around.

So as it turned out, I was in fact on a boat. Just a very, very old timey boat. Did they even still make boats like this? I spied a gaggle of men dressed identical to the two shower guys running around the place. Apparently so.

Okay. It was time for me to step up. I needed to gather more information, to win everyone over, to convince them to be my allies. My job started now.

“Huh?”

I followed this outstanding move by promptly chucking up whatever was churning around in my stomach. The guy with the bucket was sadly in the splash zone, and got a generous helping. Oops.

“Oh.” He sighed, looking mournfully at his soiled boots. His friend rushed off, either to get something to clean up my mess, or to leave him to deal with me by himself, I wasn’t sure. If it was the latter, I couldn’t blame him.

“Sorry,” I said, dragging the back of my hand over my mouth.

“It’s alright, miss,” bucket boy said, not sounding very convincing. “You musta swallowed alotta seawater. I bet you was out in that wreckage for some time, before we fished ya out.”

Wreckage? What did that mean? At least I had the good sense to keep my mouth shut, and nodded. I averted my eyes to the floor, and tried to look upset. I supposed it helped that I was partially covered in sick.

“Yes, it was terrible. Thank you, Mr…?”  
Bucket boy flushed a dark red, and straightened his back. He seemed awfully young, maybe 15 or 16. Too young for whatever in god’s name was going on.

“Th-That’s not a problem, miss,” he stammered out. “The British Royal Navy will always aid them who’ve been attacked by pirates.”

I’m sorry, did he just say pirates? What in the name of LARP-ing was going on? And the Navy...didn’t someone mention the Navy coming when I was vaguely conscious before? Guess that explained that. Sort of.  
Luckily, bucket boy hadn’t noticed my most likely incredulous expression.

“An’ I’m just Gideon, miss,” he continued. “Not mister. Just Gideon.”

Just as he finished talking, his friend returned carrying a bucket and mop, accompanied by a tall bloke decked out in a smart dark blue outfit and matching fancy hat. Judging by how fidgety the two boys acted around him, and by the ostentatious feather on his hat, he was most likely their boss.

The tall man held out a hand to me, which I took and got hauled to my feet, before he handed me a red coat. Behind him, the two boys started working on mopping up my mess, but not without the occasional nosey glance at us.

“For your modesty, miss,” he said. It was weird, how he spoke. Clipped and short, and almost excessively formal like I was his grandma or super wealthy great aunt or something.

“Uh, thanks.” I had noticed how the white shirt I was wearing had become embarrassingly see-through, and shrugged on the coat. It was about 3 sizes too big, with the sleeves brushing my fingertips, but now I was as modest as a blushing bride.  
The tall man was looking at me expectantly. Oh right, my name. Duh.

“Amy,” I replied, pulling the coat around me closer. Turns out, wet clothes made you increasingly chilly after a while. “Amy Yegg.”

“Short for Amelia, I imagine?”

Well, no, but I nodded. Until I knew what was going on fully, I decided to just agree with whatever assumptions thrown my way, and aim to keep my big old mouth shut. It wasn’t like I could tell them that a titan threw me in the middle of the ocean. And from the sounds of it, the middle of the ocean in a wreckage. It was like he was trying to make my life harder on purpose.

“Captain Norrington, Miss Ameila Yegg.” He inclined his head, I guess like a baby bow. That was nice of him.  
“If you would be so kind, Miss Yegg,” he said, gesturing towards a door behind me. Silently, I followed him, descending into the unknown.

****

“One moment, if you please Miss Yegg.” I didn’t have a chance to answer before the door was pulled shut and I heard the lock click. Fantastic. I was effectively a prisoner, again. At least this room was way nicer than the police holding room.

The Captain had led me to what was probably his cabin, as sketchy as that sounded, and I was left with my thoughts alone. I was slightly press ganged into a smart chair behind an imposing table, an impressive if aging map covering every inch of the surface. My fingers itched to fiddle with one of the baby figurines dotted over various locations, maybe arrange them into a funny position to pass the time. Thankfully, a little thread of common sense told me that would in fact be a bad idea, so I decided to stretch my legs instead. What was it the Scooby Doo clan did when faced with a mystery? Split up and search for clues.

First, a general idea of the date would be nice. Something wasn’t fully adding up, and if I was in fact, not on some extreme LARP experience, I was about to throw hands. Well, maybe not literally, but I would be pissed off to say the least. Atlas hadn’t said anything about specific time frames, or any specific details come to think of it. He just sort of kicked me out of his weird cloud palace with an apparently magical bag without so much as a “good luck!”. I really should have prodded him a bit more. Ah well, hindsight being a bitch and all that.

I scooted around the table, looking for anything that might look promising. Did you have newspapers on board a ship? Did a messenger pigeon drop them off weekly? I tried looking around the most impressive chair (clearly the Captain’s) but nothing stood out to me. There were a handful of instruments, such as a compass and those sticks with two legs that you were told to bring to math class to never actually use, but I wasn’t trying to chart a new course so I ignored them. I had a brief idea to stick a magnet to the compass to send it wild, which was quickly abandoned when I remembered that I would then be stuck at sea on a wild goose chase.

I did spy a bowl of fresh fruit, and pocketed an apple for later. I didn’t want to take my chances with any dodgy sea faring food.

Just when I had about given up hope, squeezed into a corner of the room, a little writing desk called to me. One of the cabin’s windows was partially open, making the candles atop them jiggle and wiggle. Stacks of yellowing paper were fluttering in the slight breeze, almost as if they were waving to me. Come over to us Amy, they were saying. We have all the answers you need…

How could I refuse. I darted over, conscious of my private time ending soon. I had easily been left to my own devices for long enough, and the Captain was bound to be back any moment. I mean, if I was him, I didn’t want to leave some random washed up sea sick weirdo alone in my room stuffed to the brim with fancy and breakable stuff.

I snatched up the first piece of paper, delicately covered in barely legible squiggles. God, how could people read handwriting like this? I squinted at it, scanning over the text for any kind of relevant information. A talk of a potential promotion in the following weeks... something about a girl called Elizabeth… a mention of commissioning a sword... blah blah blah, who cared. I flicked my eyes down to the bottom of the page. It was signed off by a Governor Swarn, or Swam, which was helpful in absolutely no way possible.

Wait. Didn’t people put the date at the top of the page when they wrote letters? Wasn’t that something I learned in English when I was a kid?  
I skimmed over the top of the letter. Sure enough, printed neatly on the right hand side it read:

April the 23rd, 1724

Excuse me, 1724? My heart plummeted to the very bottom of my stomach. He hadn’t…

A brisk knock at the door interrupted that particular thought, and I chucked the letter back down where I had found it. Just as the door unlocked, I darted back to my seat, trying to make it look like I had been sitting good as gold and not rummaging through a stranger’ possessions.

The Captain re-entered, followed by a couple of his red coated minions, one carrying a tray with a tea set the other a stack of clothes.

“Just there, Newt,” Captain Norrington said, and the boy scuttled to place the tray down on a little side table. I recognised him to be one of the two boys who had woke me up, and sure enough, bucket boy, Gideon, was the one with the clothes. Both of them avoided eye contact with me as if I were shooting lasers from my eyes, and bolted from the room as soon as they were done with their tasks. The door swung shut, leaving me with the Captain, a teapot and a pile of laundry.

“I have organised for you a cabin until we reach Port Royal, Miss Yegg,” the Captain said, pouring a cup of tea. “I hope you will find it comfortable for your stay aboard the Dauntless.”  
My mind was still reeling at the date at the top of the letter, and it took me a second to remember I was supposed to answer.

“That is very kind of you...sir?” I said, struggling to adjust my speech to something more old-fashioned. I couldn’t imagine he would take to modern slang particularly well. Was this how you spoke to people back then? Back now?  
He gave me a strange look.

“Please, call me Captain Norrington, Miss Yegg,” he corrected, and I mentally scolded myself. He introduced himself as that, obviously that was telling me how to address him. Idiot.

“If it would not be to bold of me,” he continued, placing down a cup of tea in front of me. “May I inquire as to what a young lady is doing taking passage to the British West Indies?”

Uhhhhh……

I reached for my tea, and took a long sip, my mind racing for some sort of plausible answer. West Indies… that was an old term that referred to the collection of islands like the Bahamas and Jamaica, right?

“I...I was looking for...work…” I eventually settled on. I held on to my tea in case I needed another excuse to delay an oncoming answer.  
Captain Norrington’s eyebrows shot up, clearly surprised. I hoped he wasn’t also suspicious of me lying.

“I must say, Miss Yegg, it is not everyday you hear a young woman looking for work out here,” he said. A jolt of relief shot through me. At least he didn’t seem outraged by my answer. “What led you to look for a position so far away from your homeland?”

I was guessing he meant England, since my accent was fairly similar to his.

“My parents died,” I said, pausing to take another mouthful of tea and to look upset. Hopefully lack of parents meant no difficult questions about my past or homelife. Hopefully.  
“My father had visited here, and talked about it often.” The lies were coming thick and fast now, as I improvised on the spot.

“I felt that by coming here, I could…” I trailed off, looking away sadly. “Could connect with him.”

I quickly spared a glance at him. Head bowed slightly, looking promising. Nice.

“Your father...I take it he was a part of the Royal British Navy?” Captain Norrington asked, his tone slightly softer than before.

“Uh…” Alarm bells went off in my head. Shit, no, he was a Captain, he could look up my last name and find out no Mr Yegg existed. What else, what else…

“He worked on merchant boats,” I said, crossing my fingers under the table. Merchants were around in Shakespear’s time, that I knew...and if they mentioned pirates, merchants must still be around, right?   
“He worked for a variety of ships, Captain. Said he always wished to see the world, so after his passing, I thought I would follow that wish.”

The Captain nodded, seeming to buy it. Phew. I was counting on the variety of ships to act as a makeshift smokescreen. Less likely to be able to find records on someone if they worked all over the place.

“And what work were you looking for, Miss Yegg? There are few respectable houses suitable for a young woman to be working in,” he continued. He started to frown, as if he’d just thought of something. “I hope I am correct in assuming you were not looking for employment in a tavern. There are many of them at ports in the British West Indies, all of them wretched and sinful places.”

Shit. To be quite honest, I was hoping I wouldn’t have to find a job but if push came to shove, I was going to say a tavern. Taverns I knew had existed all throughout history, and really how different would it be from a pub? In social standing, clearly. I did not want to piss off the person who’s boat I was stuck on.

“I, uh…” What else, what else? Respectable house...who lived in those? I hardly knew any noble or respectful families that would sound plausible.  
A sudden stroke of genius popped into my head.

“The governor!” I blurted out. “I heard there was a governor, very respectable and I was looking for employment...there.”

As soon as I said that, I clamped my mouth shut. Why had I said that? Just because a governor is mentioned in a letter to the Captain, what’s to say he wasn’t still in England? Oh god, I was going to get found out…  
I squeezed my eyes shut, dreading the worst.

“Governor...Swann?”

Oh, that made more sense than Swarn or Swam.

The Captain walked over to the writing desk, and picked up one of the letters. “Yes, he did mention he was looking for someone in a kitchen position…” he mused out loud.

“He was?” I asked. “I mean, yes. He was.”  
The Captain turned back to me, any hint of a frown gone. Good, I wasn’t going to get thrown back overboard for lying through my teeth.

“Well, Miss Yegg, it would appear you are in luck. I happen to be well acquainted with Governor Swann, and in 2 days when we dock, I shall send word. I do believe he will be most thankful that the position be filled sooner rather than later.”

I ducked my head, and tried to sound old fashioned.

“That is too kind of you, Captain. Please accept my deepest gratitude.”

Suck up to him, suck up to him, don’t get on his bad side or you will get no-where…

Captain Norrington’s stiff demeanour didn’t change, but I could spy his cheeks growing pink. He cleared his throat, clearly pleased but trying not to show it.  
“Of course, Miss Yegg. Now, if you would follow me, I believe you may wish to rest in your cabin.”

I smiled up at him, and stood up. Yes, I think I had earned a lie down after all of my deception.

***

Alone in the relative comfort of my own space, I stripped off my still damp clothes. The clothes I had been given were just the regular uniform of the Navy, but I welcomed them gratefully. My nose wrinkled as I threw my soiled clothes onto a pile on the floor. I had almost forgotten I had thrown up in them.

As I had been shown my cabin, I had received odd stares from everyone I had passed and I had wondered if they had ever seen a girl before. And then remembered that I was dressed in trousers. Not even historically accurate ones at that. Quickly, I decided that if anyone asked, I was going to stick with the story that the ship I had been on prior saw the pirates coming and that I had put on spare men’s clothes so as to not draw unwanted attention to myself.

That seemed relatively fair, right?

I was just not looking forward to wearing the many heavy layers of women's clothing demanded of thee time period, and especially not in the unforgiving tropical sun.

As I reached for the clean shirt they had provided for me, I saw a cloth strip wrapped around my left wrist. Of course, I had almost forgotten about that. I let my wind wander back to the events of the day. That moment when I had been battling for consciousness felt more like a dream, and yet here was proof it had happened.

Despite being tied almost impossibly tight, the fabric was soft, and worn. A battered and kinda mucky cream, that was no doubt once white, with thin little red stripes running through. It certainly didn’t match any of the Navy uniform, but other than that, it held no clues about its owner.

I frowned, and started to untie it. My wrist hadn’t felt noticeably painful or sore, but maybe I had cut it and not realised?

I pulled the cloth off, to reveal...my wrist. Just as it was. Then why…  
As I turned my wrist over to examine it, it hit me like a freight train.

My wrist was exactly as it had been before. Which included my tattoo.

A black line work rendition of an ouroboros, the snake that ate its own tail. There was no mistaking it for anything other than a tattoo, and if my history knowledge served me right, tattoos were something that respectable young ladies avoided like the plague. Especially ones of snakes, that were at the time related to the devil and death.  
I quickly re-wrapped my wrist, tying the piece of cloth as tightly as I could, my mind racing.

Whoever had wrapped my wrist had done it to protect me.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I know this is still a lot of set up, but I'm hoping to have some of the other main characters show up in the next chapter! As canon has not yet started (but will soon) Jack will take a little longer, but should be introduced soon!  
> All comments, kudos and bookmarks are welcome and adored!


	3. Chapter 3

Deep breath… focus...find your inner peace, or whatever…

I squared my shoulders, and stared at my designated foe.  
The battered leather bag stared back blankly, propped up on the pillow of my borrowed bed.

“So,” I said, narrowing my eyes. “We can do this the easy way, or the hard way. Which is it to be?”  
The bag didn’t move. Ah, so we had a non-talker on our hands, was that it?

“Listen to me very carefully, Signor Bolsa. I was told you held special properties, that you were part of an unusual clan, if you will. That you had the ability to give me anything I required, within reason of course. And yet, you seem to be putting up a resistance, hm? For the past two days, I have requested and you have remained noticeably empty. What do you have to say in your defence, Signor Bolsa?”

The rocking of the ship made the stupid bag bob up and down in my eyeline, infuriatingly nauseating. The leather strap slumped down, but again, I was given the silent treatment.  
“Oh come on!” I whined, refraining from stamping my feet like a toddler. “Give me something to work with! Two days, two days I’ve been stuck without soap or a toothbrush or just even a nice bottle of water, and you’re giving me nothing! Why can’t you be like Dora the Explorer’s bag, he always sang a little song.”

I threw myself onto the bed, defeated. I was getting pretty close to running out of ideas, which never happened to me. I always managed to think of at least something different to try in the face of adversity, and the stupid book bag had left me stuck. At least it was very in keeping with traditional Greek mythological epics; the gods (or titans) gave you a magic item for it to either take ages to figure out how to work or to bring you to your natural demise. I was just eager to stay away from the latter. 

It wasn’t like it came with any instructions, and Atlas had chosen not to indulge me with such information. I had tried asking it nicely. I had tried demanding it to work. I had tried asking it in my mind (just in case it was psychic, you never know). I had tried writing down what I wanted on a piece of paper and feeding it the bag like a light snack.  
Nothing had worked. 

“Fat load of use you’re being, Signor Bolsa,” I mumbled to it, turning over in my bed. 

It had been a pretty uneventful few days aboard the large ship, the Dauntless everyone called it. After a dreamless sleep the day I had been brought aboard, I had tried coming up to the deck for lack of anything else to do. Everyone avoided me like the plague, not even meeting my eyes most of the time and just staring at the floor. Eventually, I managed to wheedle out of one of the more seasoned sailors what the big deal was.

“Aye, they say it’s bad luck to have a woman on board, miss,” he had said, his mouth a grim line as he sucked on a pipe. “And one with red hair, well…”  
Ah yes, of course, how could I forget? My biggest crime was having tits. And my hair was more of a dark auburn, if we were to be pedantic. 

“Seriously?” I had asked flatly. Around us, all the soldiers scurried away if I caught them looking at us, not unlike skittish ants. 

“Mm,” he agreed. “Although, I would wager your lack of proper attire might be another cause. Hardly your fault at all, miss, but I should think the army lads know better than to stare at a lady dressed in breeches.”

So I had more or less stayed in my cabin the rest of the trip, unless my stomach really protested with the bobbing of the ship.  
My review so far? 1724 was boring. ADHD did not help the matter.  
I hadn’t asked anyone for anything to help me pass the time such as books or writing materials, as I didn’t know if that was seen as “unladylike”, however infuriating a notion that may be. Last thing I wanted to do was offend the people who had essentially fished me out of the sea.  
It wasn’t like I knew nothing, though. I worked as a makeup and hair artist on small films, and I had studied such topics along with costume, so I was fairly aware of the time period in terms of style and dress. Social cues on the other hand? Less so. 

A knock on my door pulled me out of my sulking on my bed.

“Yes?”

Captain Norrington entered, and I sat up quickly. Talking of social cues, I was pretty sure it was rude in any time period to receive guests in the middle of throwing a wobbly. 

“Ah, Miss Yegg.” He cleared his throat and managed to look at every other item in my room except for me. I wasn’t offended, this was how he had been talking to me for the past two days with my borrowed Navy outfit. 

“I am pleased to inform you that we will be pulling into Port Royal within the hour, should the weather remain fair,” he said.  
Fair weather, huh? That’s funny, I usually pronounced it “fucking-sweltering-humid-and sticky-with-no-god-damn-air-conditioning”.

“Oh,” I replied, trying to look pleased. “How wonderful.”

Okay, it wasn’t like it was bad news, per say. But I had just gotten used to life on the boat, and now I could look forward to getting a busy job in a sweltering climate.  
Great. 

“I’ll come by when we have docked, Miss Yegg,” he continued, as he turned back to the door. “I have a gift in mind for you.”

***

Okay, okay, okay. I had to admit, this was kinda cool. 

“And how does the fit suit you, miss?” the seamstress asked, lacing up the back of my new pair of stays. 

“Very well, thank you.” I twisted my body around, checking out my new look in the polished sheet of metal she had brought on board to serve as a mirror. Scratch that, this was extremely cool. I could see the sides of my mouth twitching as I tried to keep my historical costume fangirl under control. 

As I stood, I had on a loose linen shift (an underdress) and the pair of stays (an early version of a corset) sat snugly on my hips, pushing upwards to support my chest. Though I knew that despite the general consensus being that corsets and stays were tight restricting garments and they were in fact super practical, even I was surprised at how comfortable they were.  
I probably found it even more agreeable than modern day bras, especially as I was unfortunately cursed with a larger chest, which meant a whole lotta aching shoulders and back pain to boot.  
If I was to complain, it would just be about my rising body heat, and I knew it was only more layers from here.

The seamstress smiled at me, tucking the excess ties into the back. “Excellent, miss. The Captain is being most generous, is he not?”  
She turned away to get my petticoat and pocket, and I had to agree. When he said about getting me a gift, I was thinking like a piece of fruit or something. I most certainly didn’t expect a new wardrobe.

“Yes, most generous,” I echoed, as she looped the ties for a little cloth pouch (ye old pocket) around my waist, so it sat at my newly cinched waist. The petticoat followed, being thrown over my head in a flurry of fabric, and made from a more durable linen that tied both at the front and back. I liked this layer a lot; cute dusty pink did wonders for me.

Due to the tropical climate, I was praying that people would have sense and call it a day, so this would be the last layer. No such luck. How could a look be complete without a thick woollen skirt and apron? That was definitely the most logical move when you were stationed in the Caribbean. 

I shifted a little, becoming increasingly aware of the sweat beading on my forehead. I was also greatly aware of my thighs starting to overheat and stick to each other. Wonderful, I was so looking forward to the chafing. 

It was a weird feeling, though. Despite all the layers, my crotch was left uncovered. Yes, it was in keeping with the time period, yes, I was wearing skirt after skirt after skirt. Didn’t stop me from feeling a bit scandalous. I knew what I wore as modern undergarments were at least two centuries away from being designed, but it still felt pretty inappropriate to be getting dressed without anything pulled over my hoo-ha.  
I just hoped I wouldn’t have too many struggles when I had to pee. 

As the seamstress was pinning shut a sort of woollen jacket I was motioned to shrug on, a sharp rap at my door snapped me out of my head. 

“You can come in, I’m decent,” I called out, trying to discreetly unstick my sweaty thighs. I smoothed out my apron, taking in my polished reflection. If only I wasn’t overheating, because the things I would have done in the 21st century to get my hands on historically accurate 18th century dress…  
Maybe when I finished doing Atlas’s thing, I could hang onto the clothes. It seemed only fair. 

I turned around to see the Captain standing in the doorway, and I ducked into a little curtsy. I dunno if that was the right response, it just seemed appropriate. Soon I would be bowing and scraping and saying stuff like “beggin’ your pardon miss”. I was getting good at this.

“Ah, Miss Yegg. I take everything is to your liking?” 

“Yes, Captain. I must express my deepest gratitude for this gesture.” I figured if I padded out what I wanted to say with as many syllables as possible, it was sure to sound more old timey. 

He cleared his throat, and stood up straighter. Ah, struggling to receive any compliments or thanks; very British indeed.

“That is quite alright, Miss Yegg. I have talked with Governor Swann about your situation, and he will organise your payments for your clothes. I expect your debt will be settled within the year.” 

Oh. So when he said “gift”, what he really meant was “I will give you things but you can pay for it!”. Captain Norrington looked pleased, so I guessed this was still seen as exceptionally generous (even if it really wasn’t actually a gift).  
“Oh...what good news!” I said, struggling to sound positive. Like, okay, I’d guessed that servants bought their own uniform, but still. Meanie.

He ducked his head at me. “Indeed it is, Miss Yegg. I expect you to come up to deck once you have gathered yourself. I have appointed a chaperone to escort you to the Governor’s house.”

After he left, the seamstress followed shortly after, and I was alone again. I eyed my bag, still sitting innocently on my bed. Surely one more time wouldn’t hurt…

I closed my eyes, and tried to clear my mind. Easier said than done. I always remembered as a kid when people talked about emptying their thoughts for meditating, and I thought they were joking. My mind stayed firmly full of chatter and nonsense. Evidently, my ADHD really wasn’t on my side today. 

“Uh...what do I want...what would be useful right now...” I mumbled aloud, mentally flicking through various options.  
Oh wait, duh. Money.  
(word on the street was that you could exchange money for goods and services)

“Signor Bolsa, I would very much like to have some, uh, money. Please,” I added, in case my bad attitude this morning had made him upset.  
I stuck my hand in. Nothing. 

“Gah!” I exclaimed, grabbing the bag strap as I stormed out of my room. “We’re going to have some words later.”

***

I was right about one thing - it was hot as balls, and I definitely shouldn’t have had to be wearing a pair of stays, a shift, two skirts, and a partridge in a pear tree.  
My thighs, as predicted, had already started to get sore from where they rubbed together. Before I committed to going above deck, I ripped a strip of fabric from my borrowed Navy shirt to weave between my legs, and I just hoped that it wouldn't fall down. The downside was it made me walk kinda funny, in a slight waddle. I was almost certain that Atlas was pointing and laughing at me.

As I came up to the deck, the contrast to when we were at sea was like night and day. Gone was the relatively quiet deck, and instead I was greeted with noise that was near deafening with all the hustle and bustle. Sailors and Navy personnel whipped past me carrying everything under the sun; barrels, kegs of gods knew what, rope, dead chickens, live chickens, guns.  
No-one even gave me a second glance, which after two days of staring felt pretty good. Finally, I was quite simply a wholly uninteresting feat of nature. 

The sun blazed down, hard and sharp, and I could just imagine what kind of damage it was going to do to my shoulders. Even if I was fortunate not to burn quickly in tropical weather, I was only human. Well, I still did have the remains of the Navy shirt…  
Folding the extra fabric into a vague triangle, I did my best to weave through the thick of people to where the Captain was standing looking out to the port. 

“Miss Yegg,” he greeted, as I threw my makeshift fichu (or shawl, but I wanted to be fancy) over my poor shoulders and knotted it. 

“Captain,” I said, however he didn’t break his gaze. I followed his line of sight, to see he was locking eyes with a smartly dressed young man standing on the pier. Aw, maybe they were falling in love. I glanced back at the Captain, to see his jaw was clenched tightly. Or, then again, maybe not. 

Eventually he turned to me, and gestured to the boarding ramps in front of him. “If you would be so kind, Miss Yegg.”

I would like to say I dismounted the Dauntless the picture of grace. I did not. 

From all the sailors I had encountered over the ship’s journey, I had heard the term “sea-legs” thrown around frequently. Looks like I had acquired mine, and now I was walking down something that wasn’t bobbing constantly, I had the balance ability of a drunk giraffe.  
So naturally I tripped on the last step, and went flying. Thankfully for me, an arm shot out to prevent me from falling flat on my face.

“Oh, thank you, sir,” I said, only to discover I was saved by the young man Captain Norrington had been staring at.

Huh. That was weird. There was something about him that read so familiar, something that was on the very tip of my tongue, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Maybe it was that all men with brown hair and brown eyes looked pretty similar to me, but then again...I wasn’t sure. 

I was positive I was gawking at him with scrutiny when the Captain appeared at my side. “I see you have met Mr Turner, your chaperone Miss Yegg.”

“Ah, yes, Captain.” Turner, Turner, Turner...aggravatingly, nothing came to mind. That was going to drive me insane. 

The walk up to my new workplace was decidedly quiet. I wasn’t sure if Mr Turner was not one for small talk, I had accidently got off on the wrong foot with him, what with nearly falling on my face and all, or if I was more concentrated in not developing a stitch and heat stroke. 

“So, how did you come by Port Royal, Mr Turner?” I asked, trying to level my uneven breaths. The piece of fabric between my legs had slipped down a bit, and the wonderful chafing had begun. My haphazard fichu-shawl was tacky with sweat (lovely), and the nape of my neck was most definitely burnt.

He seemed surprised I had asked. Guess he was hoping to avoid all conversation. My bad.

“I was found in a shipwreck 8 years ago,” he said softly. He had slowed his pace down, which granted me a moment to catch a breather.  
“The governor and his daughter,” he faltered off for a second before picking back up again. Weird. “Miss Swann. They brought me back here, and I’ve been an apprentice at the blacksmiths ever since.”

“So, you are, like, friends with them? After they saved you?” I internally winced when I realised I had slipped “like” into my speech. Needed to work on that.

Mr Turner turned to me, slightly aghast. “Friends? I owe them my life, Miss Yegg, but a blacksmith? Friends with the governor? England must have changed more than I thought since I left.”

Uhhhhhh…  
“Oh, uh, of course! I- I just- I didn’t mean to-” Cute, I was babbling now. I thought Atlas said I was good at this kinda stuff?

At least it made him smile, lighting up his whole face. I felt my cheeks start to heat. Great, now I was blushing at the first guy who smiled at me. I hoped Atlas hadn’t bet his whole hand on this situation working out, by the record I was going. 

“It was a sweet thought, Miss Yegg. Do not trouble yourself, I meant no offense,” he said.  
In front of us, an impressive manor house grew closer, a modest driveway (carriage way?) snaking up through a collection of perky palm trees and cheerfully bright bushes. Aha, bingo.

“It would seem that my duty as a chaperone has come to its natural conclusion, Miss Yegg.” Mr Turner, turned back to me with a boyish grin. Perhaps he was warming to me after all. “But a true gentleman would see a young woman to the door. Well, the servants’ entrance at least.”

I grinned back. Friends with the governor may have been off-limits, but I’m sure he could be friends with a new kitchen hand. And I desperately needed friends.  
Sure, I had talked and mingled with those on board the Dauntless, and I had spoken a fair share with the Captain, but they had all been so stiff and wooden with me. I got a feeling that Mr Turner and I were going to become fast friends. 

“Will!” An excited yelp caught both of our attention, most definitely Mr Turner’s. I cast a sideways glance to him, and his expression looked like a kicked puppy, all big eyes and earnest.  
A poofy figure started running towards us, wilfully ignoring the protests from an assortment of smartly dressed folks, who I assumed were staff. As she got closer, I could see Mr Turner’s face turn a pretty shade of pink. 

“M-Miss Swann!” I was amazed he managed to say anything at all, by how overwhelmed he was looking.  
Turning away from his probable self-implosion, I got a good look at Miss Swann.

Oh.

Oh no.

She beamed at him, having not noticed me gawping at her yet. “Will, must I tell you every time I see you to call me Elizabeth?”

“It would appear so, Miss Swann,” he said, ducking his head into a slight bow. Seemingly remembering my existence, he straightened up and gestured to me.

“I was chaperoning Miss Yegg here, since I was called to pick up an order from your father. She will be filling the most recent staffing position here.”

I just kept staring at her, thoughts whirling through my head a thousand miles an hour. 

Because I’d recognise Keira Knightly’s face anywhere. And in 18th century dress? With Mr Turner looking obviously like Orlando bloody Bloom, because of course he did and I was an idiot for not recognising it earlier. And the Caribbean, oh come on!  
Easily over a hundred other seemingly unsolvable details slotted into place, fitting together like a massive jigsaw that I had just managed to see the bigger picture. 

I was going to throttle that fucking titan.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am so sorry this took so long to get out, I knew what this chapter was going to contain, I just got so unbelievably stuck at some points (and I wanted to do some historical research to help pad out the story into a mildly realistic setting)  
> Anyways, I hope you like it! Stay tuned for a new chapter hopefully a little quicker than this one took (fingers crossed, anyway!)  
> All comments, kudos and bookmarks are welcomed and adored!  
> Alex x


	4. Chapter 4

I was barely granted any time to soak in the news. After Will took me up to the servants entrance, I was whisked away in a cloud of chores to complete. Like, I understood a hands-on approach to work, but seriously? It had been a grand total of 3 minutes. 

I think my official job title was “scullery maid”, it was thrown around me a fair bit. And even though I couldn’t google to see where that left me on the social hierarchy within the house, I was fairly certain I was left smack dab at the bottom. I didn’t enquire about it. 

“Mm, away with the fairies, that one. Soft in the head,” the cook had tutted in my general direction after handing me a generous armful of dirty pans. I felt it was hardly my fault if I seemed a bit dazed, considering how I had just recently found out that I was supposedly within a fictional story. I didn’t think too hard about the logistics. If there could be a teleporting titan, an as-of-yet useless magic bag, then sure, why not. I was in a family friendly pirate blockbuster.   
But it wasn’t everyday you were thrown into one, so forgive me if I seemed a little distracted. 

What I was particularly concerned about was I only had a vague recollection on what happened. It had been easily ten years, if not longer, since I had seen the first film, and the details were pretty hazy. 

I could kinda remember the beginning; someone proposes to Keira Knightly, she falls into water with a pirate necklace on, is fished out and then threatened by Johnny Depp impersonating Keith Richards, some other pirates who are actually zombie pirates trash the place, and Orlando Bloom commits piracy in the name of love. And that was pretty much it. More than I expected to remember, but still. Not a lot. 

I certainly didn’t remember any character named Calypso. In fact, the whole Greek mythology tie-in was news to me. So, what was I supposed to do, guess? Wave something sharp and pointy at anyone who could be a Greek goddess in a human body? Weirdly, I didn’t see that going over well. I didn’t even know if I was at the start of canon, if we were to use professional terms, but I did distinctly recall that Elizabeth Swann had mostly converted to being a shiver me timbers pirate after the first one (which may or may not have attributed to my bisexual awakening at age twelve), and she was most certainly not there yet. 

Rule of thumb - if she was still in a poofy dress, it was most likely before she finds out that pirates can actually be kinda fun and sexy, sometimes.

Days whizzed by at a hyper speed, yet also felt exhaustingly long. Sure, I had worked long days before. It was common knowledge on a film crew that if you were a makeup artist, you would be the first to come in and last to leave, the average day clocking in around 12 hours on the go. 

This put everything else I had ever known as “work” to shame. 

Every morning around 5:30 or 6:00, I would be dragged out of a lumpy cot bed by Martha, the lady’s maid who I shared a room with. I would then proceed to be berated for not waking up on my own, while she scraped my hair back under a plain cap, in a truly 8-maids-a-milking likeness. 

Then, I was sent on my merry little way to clean pretty much all of the kitchen and surrounding area, which I was told had to be done before breakfast. God forbid the pantry having a bit of dust on the floor before breakfast.

Again, I wasn’t all too unfamiliar with cleaning and working on full steam early in the morning. The only glaring differences was that a) makeup artists for film spent around 80% of the day sitting around on set for touch-ups, and b) you worked for maybe 2 weeks straight, conked out for the next week, rinse and repeat for a month or two, and that’s a wrap, folks!

Yeah, no such luck here. 

After breakfast, I was basically stuck in the kitchen all day chopping stuff and washing pans, only to then retrace my steps in the morning and clean everything. I mean, seriously, how dirty did they think one area became after one night?

To their benefit, I was super taken aback by just how clean everything was. Well, not really clean in a modern lens, per say, but there was certainly a vigorous attempt. True, there was always a strong stench that permeated the air at all times, but after a few hours you really didn’t notice it. Martha washed everyday, with a basin of cold water and a sponge, just like a dry bath. I once suggested lighting a candle underneath to warm the water, so we wouldn’t have to wash with freezing cold water, and she looked at me like I had lost my mind. It was fine, I was getting used to it. 

“Do you wash with warm water, Amy? That’s dangerous, that is! Warm water allows sickness into the body, cold is much better for the health.”

Huh, you learnt something new everyday.

Maybe it was hospitality with having to share a room, or maybe she felt sorry for me and my unhealthy washing habits, but she was kind enough to let me use her soap, which was rich with herbs and actually smelt pretty good. She also had a little tin that was filled with a crushed up powder, for cleaning your teeth with a rag. It was completely fascinating, particularly as all I had managed in terms of dental hygiene was haphazardly trying to scrub at my teeth with a corner of my apron, to not much effect. 

“Only right to share what the Lord has gifted me to a little waif like you. I couldn’t imagine losing everything I own to them nasty pirates,” she had said.

Waif maybe was a bit of a stretch, but I decided right then and there that Martha was a friend. Even if she didn’t think pirates were cool. Just yet, at least. 

I was convinced the only reason people didn’t die of boredom in ye olden days was because everything just took so damn long. Like, washing a pan, how long should that take, really? Even one of those big old dirty ones, maybe like 5 minutes max. Not anymore!

On my first day, I had a little dish slapped in my hands, like I was supposed to know what to do with it. When I asked, the cook cuffed me around the ears and shook her ladle at me, like an even more disgruntled and fed up Gordon Ramsey. 

“Sand, you stupid girl! For scouring the pans! I take your mother raised you to be a cumberground.”

“My mother’s dead,” I said, rubbing my poor ears and sticking to my little orphan Annie storyline. And to maybe stop her from being as mean to me. It didn’t work.

“Aye, and I bet that was a grateful pass to an early grave, to be having such a blunderbuss for a child. I won’t be having any cumberground’s in my kitchen,” she scolded me, hitting me with the ladle. I didn’t know what a blunderbuss or a cumberground was, but I gathered she wasn’t calling me the sharpest tool in the shed. 

Have you ever tried scrubbing a pan with sand? I wouldn’t. At first the sand was too fine and slippery, sticking to everything while not properly removing any of the grease and just making a right old mess. And when I had finally got the hang of it, rubbing my hands raw in the process to prove that I wasn’t quite as useless as the cook said I was, I was cuffed around the ears. Again.

“You will be ruining my pans, you great blunderbuss! It takes a light hand to scour them, not your clumsy oafish one!”

Needless to say, it wasn’t a great first impression. But it helped explain why I was so exhausted at the end of every day.

I still wasn’t getting very far with my so-called “mission”. My bag was yet to be useful, I had no general time frame as to where I sat in this whole schebackle, and I didn’t know who Calypso was.  
Follow the Sparrow. That was all I had to work with. 

From the times I was outside, fetching more of that wretched sand, or putting out laundry to dry, I had tried to keep an eye out for any birds. Maybe sparrows migrated here, and I had to follow them? It was a flimsy idea, but all I was able to come up with. 

After little luck birdwatching, I asked Martha if she had seen any sparrows around here while she helped unlace my stays, and she burst out laughing. 

“My, what a funny mind you have Amy! Imagine that... sparrows, in Port Royal!”

“I don’t know much about Port Royal, Martha,” I had sighed, untying my cap and combing through my hair with my fingers. “It was worth an ask.”

And that had been the end of that. One step forward, 5000 steps back…

There was one night a terrific storm blazed through the port. The thickest raindrops I had ever seen pelting down against the dusty ground and roof, a great howling wind whipping through the nearby trees and shutters, slithering through every crevice no matter how small. 

“A bad omen, if I’d ever seen one,” Martha commented in bed, her brow knitting in worry. A rosary that she usually wore around her neck was being fed through her fingers, her thumb and forefinger rubbing the miniature crucifix. I double checked the knot on the strip of fabric concealing my tattoo. If she was invoking the power of God, I didn’t want to take my chances on the receiving end.  
“A storm this bad, and this early?”

“How do you mean?” I asked, propping myself up on one elbow. 

Martha had started chewing on her lip. She did that when she got concerned, which was often. “Storms happen often, that is true... between June and November, mostly. To have one of this scale, maybe August and September...but late May?”

Late May. Huh. So I had been here for about a month. Weird. 

I didn’t sleep well that night. The rosary must have helped, because soon after her prediction of a bad omen, Martha was soon snoring softly.   
Occasional streaks of lightning darted across the sky, faintly casting shadows through the now soaked shutters. I clutched my bag closer, feeling defeated, and so utterly alone. 

Why had I agreed to this? What was I thinking when I accepted Atlas’s deal? It was ironic, really. When I was younger, I would have given anything to have been transported into a world of adventure and pirates and swashbuckling. And yet, as I lay in a scratchy, hard bed, having had to work to the bone for a month and no proper shower, all I felt was homesick. 

I never felt homesick. I usually wanted to be as far away as I could get, not out of anything malicious, just...curiosity, I guess. I wanted to see as much as I could, to try everything, experience all the adventure and whatnot I had read about as a kid, but now I was sort of here, I hated it. 

A few tears streaked down my face, and I made no effort to wipe them. A bit pathetic, maybe, but I was just tired. Tired, and defeated, and alone. 

I curled under my sheets, pressing my bag against my chest for comfort. Selfishly, I wanted my phone. I missed having the date and time on me at all times, I missed just googling all of my questions instead of being berated by a cook, I missed constant stimulation, however detrimental it could be. 

My eyes closed, and I could see it in my mind - it’s cracked screen from when I dropped it in the bathroom, the black case I had doodled on with chalk pens, the bits of hardened glue where I had stuck gems on, which had fallen off over the years.

Something hard pressed against my chest. I cracked an eye open. Huh. That was strange. The leather bag was still nestled in my arms, but it hadn’t been hard and pokey. Then what…?  
Untangling an arm, I prodded where I felt the lump. It felt flat, and angular and-

I shot up in my bed, breathing fast. The lump was from inside my bag. My silly, not-very-magical magic bag. Gingerly, I fed my hand into it, squeezing my eyes shut.

Please. Oh please please please, give me this one thing. 

I pulled out my hand, and slowly opened my eyes. There, as true as the storm rattling against the shutters and Martha snoring in the bed next to me, was my phone, cracked screen and all. 

I couldn’t help it. I burst into tears. And you know what? I didn’t even care. 

***

Over the next few days I practiced with my wonderful, never-ever-doubted-you bag. If I pictured what I wanted, and held it in my mind’s eye, or whatever, mentally listing specific details, chances were I would get it to work.

Needless to say, it kinda revolutionised my life. Over the course of a week, I was able to pull out toothpaste, a tooth brush, soap, washing up liquid, and moisturizer. Money was a bit trickier. I didn’t really know what a shilling or a penny looked like in this economy, but after a visit to the market on Saturday, having been sent to pick up produce for the kitchen, I was able to produce them no problem. 

First thing I wanted to do was repay Martha. After all, without her assistance, I would have easily rotted away in stench. At the market, I was able to buy a small empty tin and brown paper, to put some modern day toothpaste and soap into. However grateful I was for the stuff she provided me with, I didn’t want to take the chance there was some crushed up arsenic or something.   
I also spied a tiny vial of rose scented oil, that may or may not have been slipped into my pocket when I asked the vendor to show me some of his scented muslin bundles. On my way back, I spotted a yellowing page nailed to a local shop, which cheerful stated that thieves could face hanging and branding, and I decided maybe not to test my luck in the future. 

Martha was delighted by her gifts. “How would you even come across such trinkets, Amy?” she asked, while experimentally sniffing her rose oil. 

I smiled, which I hope came across as innocent. Silver tongue, silver tongue... 

“You would not believe my luck! Where I thought all my possessions lost to the sea or stolen by pirates, my dear bag had my savings tucked away! I must have been a fool to miss it for so long, but I cannot tell you how thankful I am to have recovered it.”

“That is fortunate,” she agreed, sticking her finger into the tin of toothpaste and trying it. As soon as the paste hit her mouth, her eyes widened, and she turned away, retching. 

“Good Lord,” she gasped, retrieving her toothbrush-rag and furiously scrubbing at her tongue. “What on earth is that stuff, my mouth feels as cold as winter!”

Oops. I guess modern toothpaste could seem a little overwhelming if the most adventurous thing you had ever eaten was an apple. 

Last on my magical wish list was a little detective notebook and pen, for all my detecting, which I scribbled away in once Martha was asleep at night. I jotted down all I could remember about what I could expect to come, everything with the pirate necklace and Elizabeth and Will and that. ‘Calypso’ circled several times had its own double page spread, which was the area that left me stumped the most. I definitely didn’t think I was going to find her while working in a governor’s house, but aside from my useless hint of chasing after a bird that didn’t even exist here, I had very little to go on. 

I figured I needed at very least a boat, and, well, someone who knew how to actually sail it. And if Will turns to piracy once Elizabeth is kidnapped by zombie pirates, I was gonna stick to him like glue. Besides, undead zombies could have been the result of greek god meddling, you never knew. Admittedly, not the best plan, but the best I could work with.

The next day as me and Martha were stripping down for bed, she seemed oddly excited.   
“You would never suspect what I have seen delivered tonight,” she said slightly smug, as she brushed through her long dark hair.

“Well, now I’m just burning with questions, Martha.” I grinned at her, flicking water at her face which made her laugh in surprise.

“What a wretched girl you are! I cannot blame cook for all her grievances with you,” She paused, smiling back at me to let me know she meant no harm. “I shan’t tell you if you keep acting so rotten.”

I threw my hands up in mock hurt. “Oh, how you wound me so! Please, ever so darling Martha, indulge me with what you know.” 

The longer I had been here, the easier I found it to speak like everyone else did. I mean, we all had our pretentious writer phase at fourteen, right? How much different was this. 

She sighed theatrically. “Very well! I saw the biggest dress box you could ever imagine, all the way from London.”  
Leaning in closer, her eyes darted to the door like she was indulging in truly scandalous talk, and she lowered her voice. 

“And I overheard the governor talking to a certain Captain Norrington this very evening. The Captain is being promoted tomorrow, and from what I gathered, he was asking the governor’s permission to propose! He is planning to ask Miss Elizabeth for her hand!”

Oh, well now that was very interesting. Wheels started turning in my head. 

So it begins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ayo, I hope you enjoyed! Originally, this was going to be a much longer chapter, but I felt that publishing this part first, because I need to rewatch a bunch of scenes from canon to make sure I integrate it well. Also, I did quite a bit of research and I just found it all so interesting I wanted to share as soon as possible! Most of what is referenced here is based of early 18th century research, down to a scullery maid's duties, how pans were cleaned, and personal overall hygiene! If anyone is interested in that area of history, I can link the websites I used for reference x 
> 
> And a "blunderbuss" is "a stupid, blundering fellow" and a "cumberhouse" is "someone so useless, they just serve to take up space"!
> 
> found at https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/61819/42-old-english-insults   
> and https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/527096/25-great-insults-18th-century-british-slang
> 
> in case you're interested!
> 
> All comments, kudos and bookmarks are welcomed and adored!  
> Alex x


End file.
